I'll be the first to admit that sometimes?  If I'm really honest?  I get tired of taking photos.  I get bored with the same old angles and depth of field and eye-popping color.  When this happens, it's usually related to taking pictures of my daughter Cadence because Lord knows I've taken thousands of shots of her.

I've serendipitously found that the best thing to do when I hit the shutter block is to break the rules.  Now, now, I know we would mostly agree that there aren't hard and fast rules in photography, but if we're honest, we probably set up rules for ourselves in the way that we personally shoot on a day-to-day basis.   Sometimes they start out as habits or preferences, and then they subconsciously turn into rules.  Or some rules, we create because we're afraid we'll take bad photographs if we do things a certain way. 

You know what?  Those rules?  No one's watching to see if you're keeping them.  In fact, I bet if you start breaking some, it'll inject new life and creativity into your art.  So go ahead.  Shoot into the sun.  Shake that camera during a long exposure. Shoot at an f/8.0 instead of wide open.  Crank up the ISO.  Get down low.  Embrace the blur.  Turn off the flash.  Turn ON the flash.  Whatever YOUR rules may be--you've gotta break 'em every now and then.  It's one of the ways to improve and grow as a photographer.

What are some rules that you've consciously or subconsciously set up for yourself?  Which ones do you plan on breaking?  Please share, and don't forget to include links to images if you've broken rules. 

When I got my first digital SLR a little over a year ago, I did something kind of sily.  I called Nikon's technical assistance and asked the gentleman how to get my LCD screen to display the digital viewfinder.  I had been using a digial point-and-shoot  for over 5 years and had forgotten how to take photos looking through that tiny little peephole.  I can't tell you how embarrassed I was when the Nikon techie gently broke the news to me that as far as he knew, there was no digital SLR that had this feature*.  I was crestfallen.  To be unable to take photos from all kinds of crazy angles and perspectives and still be able to see what I was capturing before I clicked on the shutter?  I thought my photog days were surely over.

Well, I did get used to putting my eyeball to the peephole like the good old days with my film SLR but I still toyed with the idea of getting one of these really expensive puppies.  I'm glad I didn't, though, because I soon learned the joys of what folks call Shooting From the Hip.  That's when you shoot photos without looking through the viewfinder or composing the shot on the LCD.  I personally don't consider it shooting blind, however, and it's not the same as Just Shoot It when you click click click that shutter button without aiming or thinking. 

Shooting From the Hip is a skill that takes patience and practice.  You have to try it a LOT to learn how to angle the camera to aim it at what you actually want to shoot.  The more you try it, however, the easier it will get, and you'll love the freedom of being able to shoot without always having an eyeball glued to the tiny viewfinder or constantly looking down at the LCD.

One tip I have for Shooting More Accurately From the Hip is to use the focus-lock feature that most cameras have.  You can focus on what you want to shoot while looking through the viewfinder and then keeping the focus locked on it, reposition the camera and shoot.  In the photo above, I locked the focus on the pizza through the viewfinder, and then I positioned the camera at my chest level and pressed the shutter.  Another tip is to use the autofocus assist light (if your camera has one) to give you an idea of where your camera is pinpointing.  That should give you a clue as to whether you're aiming the camera at what you actually want to focus on. 

Whether your viewfinder is a tiny peephole or a digital LCD that twists and turns and does somersaults, Shooting From the Hip may become one of your favorite pastimes.  No matter how good your aim is, you never know exactly what you'll get, and THAT is the fun part.

Ready?  Aim.  Shoot!  And don't forget to share your Shooting From the Hip images and tips.

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*Edited to Add:  Actually, there are now dSLRs that come with a live view LCD.  Thanks to Laura of Dolce Pics for the heads up!

 
"Ooh! LOVE the bokeh!" "That bokeh is just magical!" "Beautiful bokeh!"

How many times have you encountered comments like those while browsing photos on Flickr? If you have no idea what *bokeh* is, or have a vague idea but aren't sure, you're probably not alone. I was pretty confused about the whole thing until I did some research recently, and actually, I'm still confused.

So what did I find out? Well, most simply put, bokeh is the Japanese word for "fuzzy," and it refers to the aesthetically pleasing out-of-focus areas of a photo, often achieved with a wide aperture or a telephoto lens. I have to admit that terms like "spherical aberration" and "circle of confusion" make my eyes glaze over, so I won't get into the technicalities here.  Besides, I'm sure you all have some mad googling skillz.

From what I'm able to gather, there are different types of bokeh. There's the creamy, smooth and silky kind that looks like you wiped that portion of the photo with a sponge. Then there's the kind of bokeh that shows the shape of the aperture--round for a large aperture that's wide open, polygonal for an aperture that's stopped down a couple stops, or even in different shapes if you want to get crafty with paper and scissors. And while there may be a general consensus as to what is and isn't considered good bokeh, I think it's pretty subjective.

Now, I've seen some really lovely bokeh in the Shutter Sisters' pool, so I know we've got a bunch of bokeh enthusiasts in our midst. Bokeh apparently has its own day of the week, not to mention numerous groups on Flickr. If you have a tip for getting really cool bokeh or have some favorite bokeh photos of your own, please share, and tag your photos with the word "bokeh" and submit them to the Shutter Sisters Flickr pool so we can enjoy all the bokeh glory in slideshow format.

P.S. I got the heart bokeh in the photo for this post by cutting out a heart in a circular piece of cardstock (you want it thick enough to block light, so black would probably work best) that would fit in the front of my 50mm f/1.8 lens (which was the perfect lens for this experiment as the glass part of the lens is set far into the lens body).  I suppose you could do the whole lens hood method, but, eh, I was happy enough with the results I got.  A tip for cutting out hearts: if you are a scrapbooker, you already know what to do.  If you are not,  you can run out and buy (or borrow) a heart-shaped hole-puncher-thingie, or you can do what I did.  I took a simple hand-held hole puncher, punched out two circles that were conjoined to create the bosom of the heart, and took sharp scissors to make the pointy bottom of the heart. 

I will be the first to admit that I would rather eat a big box of prunes than try to figure out Photoshop.  For the first 5 years that I was taking photos digitally, I did all my editing in Microsoft Photo Editor, which came bundled with Office.  I finally broke down and bought Adobe Lightroom last August, but I have stubbornly resisted using Photoshop for anything.  Believe me, I've watched and drooled while everyone around me was adding supercool textures to their photos or doing other nifty powerful things possible for those willing to delve into the world of layers and lassos and burning and dodging, etc.

Recently, I came across this photo by Quixotic Pixels in which she uses pantyhose as a filter.  This gave me the idea to take the photo above using Cadence's pink tights stretched tightly over my lens.  I really like the softness  and very subtle grain that this technique adds to the photo.  I hope to find other ways of adding texture or other effects to my photos without having to resort to learning Photoshop.

How about you?  Do you have any shortcuts or tips on bypassing Photoshop?  Please do share, as this Shutter Sister can use all the help she can get.

Back when I used to shoot with a film SLR, I often agonized over shots before I actually took them because a) film wasn't cheap; b) decent processing/printing wasn't cheap; and c) I had no idea if my settings were capturing the shots the way I wanted to or if I was wasting my entire roll of film.  I still have deep respect for the film format, but I have to admit that I'm glad to be living in the digital age when it comes to photography.  

Since I usually carry around enough memory to shoot as many photos as I could possibly want (and then some), I like to practice what I call Just Shoot It.  Basically, that's when I devote a period of time (say, 5 minutes or so) to pressing the shutter without thinking too much about the framing, the subject, exposure, etc.  I'll walk around and go *click* *click* *click* *click* in rapid sucession, sometimes without even looking through the viewfinder.  There's no pressure to get that perfect shot during these few minutes.  There's no worrying about missing a Kodak moment.  It's actually quite freeing, especially if you are in the middle of a somewhat stressful shoot like at a wedding.  

Some folks may feel like that's just a waste of memory.  Others may feel like it's faux-art if you don't put enough thought into it or scrunch your forehead just so while you're shooting the photo.  Years ago, I probably would've agreed.   Now, however, I know that there is a particular brand of joy derived from finding a gem of a photo in post-processing that you didn't even know you had taken.   In fact, I now get excited about going over my Just Shoot It photos because I never know what I'll find. 

The photo above is an example of what I'm talking about.  It was taken during several minutes of freestyle shooting at my husband's cousin's wedding.  I fell in love with it the moment I saw it during post-processing, and I knew that I could've never taken that shot if I had been thinking too much about it. 

Do you have a favorite photo that you took without too much thinking or didn't even know you had taken?  Please share with us!

P.S.  If I could set this post to music, it would be to  Click Click Click Click by Bishop Allen.